Yemisi Izuora
Nigeria is moving a forward towards establishing a national digitized network as the National Addressing Council (NAC) ratified a preliminary framework to establish a modernized and digitized national addressing system.
The framework aims to create a system that can reliably identify and locate citizens’ residences, business premises and public-service facilities.
Vice President Shettima Kashim, said, “An address is much more than a simple description of where a person lives or where a business operates. It is a link between the citizen and the state; between businesses and opportunities; between identity and services,”.
He added: “A country that cannot consistently locate its citizens and businesses has an avoidable weakness in spatial planning, commerce, security and social protection.”
The decision builds on work already underway to establish a national alphanumeric postal-code system. The federal government approved the system earlier this year, with plans to assign each address a unique identity linked to a precise geographic location and compatible with digital systems.
The planned applications extend beyond conventional postal services. Authorities expect the system to support security and emergency services as well as logistics, e-commerce, urban and national planning, and public-service delivery.
The ratification primarily seeks to align addressing governance with these new applications and improve coordination among the institutions involved in the system.
The next challenge will be to turn the institutional framework into a nationwide system that citizens, businesses and public agencies can actually use.